Chapter Text
They won’t make it back to the city before nightfall. They set up camp on some opposite hill. While Varric and Merrill passionately argue over the merits of different spices, Hawke sits away from them. He’s firmly planted there, feet sinking into the earth. Knees raised, arms resting loose over them, and he keeps his eyes fixed on distant Kirkwall. The breeze sends waves through the shifting sea of grass, blades brushing up against his skin from where his tunic had been lifted. Fenris watches his back as the breeze dies down. His tunic, the grass, settles. Hawke runs a hand through disheveled hair. The shape of Kirkwall seems a shadow of a crown upon his head. Fenris leaves his sword behind before he goes to sit with him.
Legs crossed, hands clasped in his lap, Fenris keeps his eyes fixed on the same point of the horizon that Hawke does. Hawke reaches for the water skin beside him. “Why?” Fenris asks, pulling absentmindedly at the grass.
“Mhmm?” Hawke asks, glancing over at him as he takes a drink.
“Me. Why me?” An audible choke. Hawke leans forward just in time to have the water spill out of his mouth and onto the earth, instead of right into his own lap. A cough, a fist pounding against his chest. Fenris takes and holds the water skin for him. He ties the cap back on, places it between them. Hawke plays at clearing his throat, and Fenris knows he’s trying to buy himself some time. Fenris lies back in the grass. He watches fading clouds collide, curl into one another. Another breeze, grass brushing against his cheeks. Hawke rubs at his face, hand over his mouth, slow to pull away.
“I’ve always been in the wrong place, at the wrong time.” Fenris listens as he watches the clouds drift about each other. He keeps his hands linked over his belly. It tickles some, where those strands of hair trickle across his forehead, fall by his temple. “Bad luck. Cursed.” Fenris snorts. Hawke smiles at the sound of it, but that quickly fades, and he’s soon contemplative once again. A stretch of silence. Fenris doesn’t mind it. “But you’ve always felt,” Hawke struggles with the words, “comfortable. Right.” He flops back in the grass, crosses his arms, and resolutely closes his eyes. “I know you know as well as I do that there’s more to it than that, but the average lifespan for people in our line of work is not that high and if I do try to explain it all, we’re going to be here a very lon-” The words die in his mouth the moment he feels the soft press of lips against his. Hawke reaches up, fingers first caressing gently against Fenris’s cheek before moving to the nape of his neck. Wisps of hair brush against the back of his hand.
Gossamer green studies him through long dark lashes, and Hawke couldn’t look away even if he tried. He groans with sincere disappointment when the kiss is broken. Fenris leans back, the smile resting light on his lips. He props himself up on his elbows, closes his eyes as he tilts his face back towards the sky once again. The sun blooms warm in his cheeks and he listens to Hawke shuffle, soon feels his head drop like a stone against his chest. That, at least, gets a startled laugh out of Fenris. He raises his head, grins at Hawke, even as the man looks at him miserably. “Do you have any idea how much I love you?” Hawke sighs the question. It earns him another soft chuckle.
“I think I am beginning to,” Fenris tells him with a smile.